Late last night I returned home to Boston from a business trip that went quite well yet allowed me very little time to be online much the last few days. Although I am very tired from the trip, to say the least(!) there was some things about my trip that I couldnt help but take note of. Maybe some of the things that I'm about to discuss are quite commonplace in airports worldwide, and maybe they've been going on longer than I have suspected, but either way, I do feel compelled to write about them because to an extent, I found myself surprisingly shocked and/or thoroughly disgusted by the ways my fellow travelers behaved in certain scenarioes. Everything in this piece is based on my own personal experiences from this past week but hopefully others may be able to identify with them.
In addition, posterous.com was majorly fucking up with alotta folks blogs before I left for my trip so I hope this baby autoposts rather nicely and problem-free when its time to publish it. Not to piss-n-moan but it better because even though the business trip was successful, this crankshit of being gone a few days, having a touch of jet-lag and then having to return to work right away this morning has really put my dick in the dirt.(that's a slang term for feeling extremely exhausted, no sexual inference intended). Okay, let's get down to business....
The Elderly In-Motion. I'm not gonna bitch about how slow some elderly folks are when it comes to navigating airport concourses and what-not because I have no problem with them whatsoever in that regard. In fact, not only do I hope to live long enough to become elderly but I sure as hell hope I can move around as dilligently as some of them do when I get to be their age. My problem is with those airline personnel and fellow travelers who are downright mean-n-nasty towards the elderly folks out there who have difficulty dealing with those check-in kiosk computers at airline ticket counters. There were a couple of people both at Boston Logan and Chicago O'Hare who came very close to having the living shit smacked right outta them by yours truly. I'm not kidding, I was just livid! I wanted sooooo bad to scream "HEY!!! Instead of being mean and pressuring these dear people, wouldnt it be more productive to ask others if they need a bit of help, or better yet, remind airport personnel that they need to assist their customers more efficiently??" Getting all riled up and being impatient towards others isnt gonna solve anything. That's addressed to both the airline check-in counter personnel AND my fellow travelers. I realize we all live in an era where it's rush-rush and crisis-crisis every time we turn around but just remember you little nasties, someday you're gonna be elderly too so some of you out there need to get a hold of yourselves and offer a bit of assistance as well as a dash or two of compassion towards your fellow travelers, both on the airlines AND in life in general.
Big people. I've already written several times on the issue of how society and people in general are extremely vicious and evil towards people who are overweight but as the Universe as my witness, the next time I'm flying, I'm gonna be very tempted to walk over to and smack the living shit outta anyone who makes one single derogatory remark towards an overweight individual. I'm serious. I'm not gonna lecture the world about how there are many overweight people out there who for whatever various medical circumstances have a bit more extra body-weight than the rest of us, nor do I care to hear from any whiny, rich twig-people preach about how "unhealthy" it is for people to be overweight. The bottom line is this - you DO NOT degrade your fellow human beings because of the way they look/their physical appearance. Why the hell is it so fucken difficult for people to grasp that concept?
On my flight between Boston and Chicago, there was this overweight lady who sat down in the row of seats behind me and right before the plane took off, after both her row and my row were filled, a guy who was sitting next to her pushed the airline stewardess/steward button and said to the stewardess "I dont feel comfortable sitting here, I'd like to request another seat." Instantly the stewardess knew exactly what the guy was referring to, so she actually got a bit indignant (good for her!) and said "Sir, what is the problem? The passenger next to you does not appear to be harassing you and I'm sorry, but this flight is totally booked. Should a seat open up, I'll be more than glad to reseat you." Naturally, you could tell the woman in question was quite upset by the entire matter, but then the stewardess leaned over and said to her "M'am, if there is anything I can do for you, please dont hesitate to call on me." Meanwhile, I was just a-fuming. So, after they served us our complimentary refreshments and the stewardesses/stewards went around collecting garbage, the very same stewardess came over to me, held out the garbage bad and I said to her "Oh, there's some garbage in the seat directly behind me, would you mind removing that too??" and we both almost cracked up and she whispered to me "Cute, very cute!" I turned around and looked at the overweight lady and she lipped to me "Thank you!" and smiled. I usually dont stick my nose into other people's business but when folks mistreat others I get really hocked off about that kinda stuff.
When we were deplaning in Chicago, the overweight lady came up to me and said "You know, I think that man sitting next to me heard you!" and I said to her "We can only hope Dear, we can only hope!" So we both laughed and she wished me well as I did her too. In this sometimes crazy world it's a big enough job looking out for ourselves but I think we all need to do a bit better on looking out for others too. Maybe, just maybe, the world might be a bit more pleasent for everyone if we did.
Barefoot-mania. I dont have any problem with folks who wear sandals, flip-flops or even go barefoot. In fact, I wish I could do the latter more often myself but my podiatrist and endoncrinologist have both repeatedly told me that I need to be extra-careful with my feet due to my diabetes. Be that as it may, what I do have a problem with is people, who for whatever reason, insist on unsocking their feet in airport sitting areas and just letting their tootsies hang out all over the place. What the hell is up with that? Isnt everyone aware of the dangers of things such as staph infections, MRSA and the like? Damn, I dont care how uncomfortable or sweaty my tootsies may or may not become while traveling on any airlines, you will never see me undressing my feet in any public place unless I'm at my local hospital ER or I'm about to go swimming. While I was sitting at Chicago O'Hare I saw a few folks doing that and I thought to myself "What the fuck??" People need to have proper etiquette manners when traveling and I dont care how Bostonian-snooty that sounds, that should apply to everyone no matter who you are.
One more thing. People can rave all about Chicago O'Hare International airport all they want but when I arrived there, it was over 83 degrees and get this - they didnt even bother to turn on their damn airport air conditioners!! O'Hare, which I believe is the 2nd largest airport in America (or at least in the Top 5 when it comes to sheer size) welcomes travelers from all over the world, but obviously NOT ONE of their airport officials bothered to look at the weather forecast for that day and say "Gee, it's gonna be hot today, maybe we better turn the air conditioning on?" Like, duhhhhhhh!!!! I mean, where the hell is people's common sense these days?? I'll tell you one thing, if anyone at Boston Logan woulda done something that moronic, there woulda been a whole helluva lotta people getting fired that day. I'm serious. There were literally THOUSANDS of people deplaning at that airport that day and all you heard everywhere was "Jesus Christ, I hope they let us board early, it's so damn hot in here!!" Whatta buncha nitwits. Trust me, if the rest of y'all had been flying that day, you too woulda felt it was equally ridiculous that everybody was sweating their asses off. That was totally uncalled for. Damn. Chicago O'Hare airport. Pffft.
So, there are my thoughts on traveling the somewhat unorganized, unfriendly skies these days. I know that the airlines are just like the rest of us these days, they too are struggling and have their bad days too but I still think they could work a bit better on their organizational capabilities. As for my fellow travelers, I dont care how frequently one flies in-and-outta our nation's airports (or any other travel venue for that matter) people need to learn better social skills when interacting with their fellow travelers as well as the general public. We all wanna have good travel experiences but it's kinda hard to do that when people are being just downright rude to others. My experiences when traveling this past week may be just one account outta millions but it doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure out that the human race still has some work cut out for itself. I hope that everyone hadda good week while I was gone and as always, thank you for reading.
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